Winnipeg Artist Elected Fellow of Royal Canadian Geographical Society

On 16 November of 2017, Winnipeg artist R.F.M. McInnis was elected to the College of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. In an e-mail, the Society stated, “It is a form of recognition given your remarkable travels in Canada and stunning landscapes.” It then added…"Few have seen the prairie and foothills as you have, such power and evocative beauty.”

The College ranks among its members since its inception in 1929 such notables as Fredrick Banting, artist AY Jackson, former Alberta Premier Peter Lougheed, several Prime Ministers, including the Right Honourables John Turner, Kim Campbell and Stephen Harper.

The College is the voting body of the Society, electing the President, members of the Board of Governors, as well as new Fellows. Fellows are entitled to use post-nominal letters FRCGS after their surname. Fellows are deemed to have distinguished themselves in their various fields from science to the arts “Making Canada Better Known to Canadians and the World.”

Robert McInnis has lived in Winnipeg for the past twelve years, painting the female figure, the landscape south and west of Winnipeg, along with images of back alleys in the Fort Rouge area. He is represented by galleries across Canada, including Mayberry Fine Art in Winnipeg and Roberts Gallery in Toronto where he recently held back-to-back 75th birthday exhibitions, representing 55 years of a painting career, and The Front Gallery in Edmonton.

Review by Gilbert Bouchard of a 2005 retrospective at The Front Gallery in Edmonton

His work is in many public galleries across Canada, including the Beaverbrook Gallery in Fredericton, the Glenbow Museum in Calgary, The Art Gallery of Alberta, The Red Deer College Collection, The Library and Archives of Canada (RFM McInnis Fonds R5873), Bibliothèque Nationale du Québec, Office of the Chief Justice of Canada, Saskatchewan Arts Council, Mckenzie Gallery, Regina and The New Brunswick Museum, the Railway Museum of Canada, Saint-Constant, Québec, and many others. Among his portraits are included artists Joane Cardinal-Schubert, Dorothy Knowles, Joseph Plaskett, as well as Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, Peter Pocklington, James A. Coutts, Maureen McTeer and Margaret Atwood.

His career started when he left art school in 1961 and took a job as a newspaper reporter in Saint John, New Brunswick where he was born. This led to an interest in photography which in turn led to joining the Royal Canadian Air Force (1962-66) for photo training. It was the beginning of many planned moves across Canada to paint the landscape of every region. By age 30, the art career was in full force with moves from Ottawa to Vancouver (1967), to Toronto (1973), Calgary, 1978), Montreal, (1982) Ottawa (1983), Edmonton, (1986), Connemara, Alberta, (1993), Winnipeg, (2005).

With his wife Françoise Cardinal, the next planned move is to Montréal, in 2020.